


Damaged

by juggieheadcoopers



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 21:46:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10930671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juggieheadcoopers/pseuds/juggieheadcoopers
Summary: Living the life as a Serpent has split Betty and Jughead apart in the worst ways possible. Jughead was sent to complete a task for the gang that put Polly in danger and because of that, Betty has distanced herself from him to the point where they barely even speak anymore. As a result, Jughead is a little lost.





	Damaged

**Author's Note:**

> This is supposed to mirror the trailer scene in a way, but the angstier side of things lol.

_I thought about it once, what it would have been like if I were to find that one person who made my heart ache with the prospect of unspoken promises and tongue-tied innocence. I never let myself think about that sort of thing - you know, the thing that might, on the unfathomable spectrum between luck and fate, lead to potential happiness._

_But looking at her - sparkling crystals for eyes and a veil of hair so golden that you would have thought you were looking at an angel wearing her halo - it was hard not to fall head first into the void of naive uncertainty and hope that came with the burden of falling in love. I was lost in everything that she was the second I stepped into that Blue and Gold office that day. And from that point on, there was no going back. I needed her. I needed her more than I’ve needed anyone in my life, and that scared me more than any chill-inducing nightmare of ghost story ever could._

_I realize now that I was selfish to feel this way. I was selfish to put her in the position of loving me. Because loving me the way she did, she was doomed from the second she kissed me back that day I crawled through her bedroom window. And her life has been damaged ever since._  
\--

Betty shut the computer screen with a painful click, Jughead’s words still lingering behind her eyelids as she leaned back onto the beat-up couch in his father’s trailer, breathing in the scent of built-up dust and the pine scented air freshener plugged into the wall closest to the kitchen.

“What are you doing here?”

Standing from her spot on the couch and spinning around to face a stoic-faced Jughead, Betty noticed his too-long hair and disheveled appearance that was clouded by the classic leather jacket he had worn like a badge of honor for the past few weeks, and silently wondered how this was the same gentle, vulnerable boy she had fallen in love with all those months ago.

“I heard you were suspended from school,” Betty told him, her voice suddenly seeming too meek and unsure of itself for the way his eyes were boring into hers - hard and insistent, like he was trying to push her away with just one glance. “Jug, starting a fire in the boy’s locker room? That’s not you anymore. I thought you were past all that.” 

“’All that’ is who I am, Betty,” Jughead shot back, his features sharp and intense in the moonlit trailer as he took a bounding step in her direction. “It’s who I’ve always been. You should have figured that out the day I was taken in for questioning for the murder of Jason Blossom, maybe it would have saved us both a little pain and heartache.” 

“I wouldn’t take back a second of our time together, Jughead,” Betty said without hesitation, reaching out a tentative hand and placing it on a leather-clad shoulder. “You were the first boy I ever loved.”

“Please,” Jughead scoffed, jerking his arm away from her touch as he crossed the trailer to stand in the center of the living area. “We both know that’s a lie. You were head over heels for our ginger-haired football god of a best friend since we were innocent tykes making mud pies on the playground.” 

“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” Betty mumbled, tucking a strand of pin-straight golden blonde hair behind her ear and drawing her eyebrows together as a wave of hurt and confusion overtook her expression. “You and I both know that what I felt for Archie never even came close to what I felt for you. What I still feel.”

Taking a brave step forward to close the gap between them, Betty tugged on Jughead’s chin to tilt it downwards to meet her eyes.

“I loved Archie, sure, the way a sister loves a brother or a friend loves a friend they’ve known their entire life.” Betty’s eyes were shining wildly in the dimly lit room, locked in on his gaze so that she was sure that he was hearing every word that she was telling him. “But I was never in love with him.” 

Jughead could feel the walls beginning to crumble underneath the weight of her stare. He could feel her words beginning to resonate deep within himself. But he knew they couldn’t be true. He knew she deserved better.

“It’s not like it matters now,” Jughead mumbled, backing away from her touch once more and making his way into the kitchen, his fingertips grazing the countertop where they nearly made love before everything changed between them. “Everything’s too screwed up to ever be repaired enough for things to find their way back to what they used to be. We’re too far gone.”

“However far away you think we might be from who we were and how we used to be together, I need you to know that I’m always going to be there for you,” Betty told him. “And I will never be too far away to love you, every version of you, good or bad.” 

“How?” Jughead gaped at her, his head swimming with so many conflicting thoughts and emotions, that he was unable to fathom anything she was saying. “How could you possibly love someone like me? Someone so broken and unsure and lost. Why would you choose to love me when you could easily go back to loving someone like Archie? It’s the way things should have been from the start. I know it, he knows it, and I think that deep down a part of you knows it too.”

“Don’t you get it?” Betty whirled around to face him, her cheeks flushing a red-hot scarlet as the anger began to bubble up inside her. “It’s you, Jughead. It’s always been you and it always will be you. No matter what happens, no matter how hard you push me away I will always love you. Always. And if letting me love you was selfish, then I’m the luckiest girl in the world because it was probably the most selfless thing you could have done.”

“I’m no good for you,” he whispered, his eyes prickling with hot tears as he felt his bottom lip quiver and the barrier holding him back from giving into her completely, on the verge of crashing down. “I’m toxic in the worst ways possible and one day it’s going to eat away at the very best parts of you. The parts that made me fall in love with you. I don’t think I could live with myself if that were the case.”

“I don’t care, Juggie,” Betty whispered, her hands reaching up to caress his cheeks, holding onto them desperately as if letting go of them would cause him to disappear altogether. “You have my heart, my soul, my everything. I told you once a long time ago that I know who you are and that hasn’t changed. You are Jughead Jones. And I am Betty Cooper. And we belong together.”

In one swift motion, Jughead hoisted Betty up onto the counter, just as he had the first time they were alone together in this exact same spot, his lips pressing into hers as they urgently moved from her cheeks to her neck and lingering on her collarbone. Without wasting any time, Jughead’s hand slid up the silky smooth skin of her thighs, nudging her legs open with his hips as his fingers creeped up to rest just above the elastic band of her underwear. Betty’s head slammed back onto the cabinet, biting back a moan as Jughead’s hand slid in between her legs, his fingers already exploring the wet-hot flesh that-

“Betty!”

As fate would have it, the banging on the trailer door caused the couple to pull apart for the second time that they had been in this position. If it had been anyone but Veronica on the other side of that door, they would have continued - Jughead’s hands remaining exactly where they were, moving only to explore her body more intimately. But the urgent tone to her voice and the frantic pounding on the hard surface of the trailer caused Betty to hop off the counter, pulling her skirt down and crossing the room to swing open the door. 

“It’s Polly,” Veronica breathed, her eyes wide with panic as she tried to catch her breath. “She went into labor about twenty minutes ago, but no one could get ahold of you.”

“Is she okay?” Betty asked, her heart beating a million miles a minute and her pink cheeks flushing a pale white as fear gripped every inch of her body. 

“There were… complications,” Veronica stuttered, her voice quiet and uncertain and so unlike her own as she met her friend’s gaze with sympathetic eyes. “It’s not good, Betty. Come on, we have to hurry!”

Veronica led the way back down the path leading up to the Jones’ trailer, Betty following closely behind before stopping suddenly and looking behind her shoulder to wait for the one person who she wanted standing next to her through something like this.

“I’m here, Bets,” he assured her, lacing his fingers through hers as he hurried to catch up to their quick pace. “I’m here.” 

Uncertainties lingered all around them. Were Polly and her babies going to be okay? Were Jughead and Betty going to be able to work past who they’ve been for the past few months and find their way back to who they used to be? But with all these questions echoing in the back of their minds and floating above their heads like early morning fog blanketing an abandoned field, Betty knew one thing for certain: Jughead would always be a permanent fixture in her life. No matter what life threw at them or where they ended up, it would always be Jughead by her side. And in that moment, that was enough to keep her from falling to pieces and disappearing altogether.


End file.
